Video won't play in PPT 2010

I inserted an MP4 video on a PPT 2010 slide. When I play the slide show, it just displays as a black rectangle and doesn't play. When I try to play it in edit mode, I get this message: "The specified file cannot be played on the specified MCI device. The file may be corrupt, not in the correct format, or no fil"

Thanks for the reply. I downloaded and installed the latest QuickTime Player but I get the same result. The video plays in QuickTime Player and Windows Media Player, but not in PPT.

I read this in PPT Help: "PowerPoint 2010 64-bit is not compatible with 32-bit versions of QuickTime or Flash. You must install a 64-bit version of QuickTime or Flash, or a 32-bit version of PowerPoint 2010." Could that be the problem? How do I know what version of PPT I have? It installed to my "Program Files (x86)" folder. Doesn't that mean it's 32-bit?

You can find your "Bitness" by going to the File tab and selecting Help. It will be in the right hand pane.PPTVersion.JPG
I would think that if it is in the (x86) folder it "should" be the 32-bit version.
You should probably also verify the bitness of your QuickTime installation and make sure they match.
I would also delete the video from the presentation and re-add it just to make sure everything gets setup properly.

My Office 2010 is 32-bit, and I'm assuming QuickTime is too, though I haven't been able to confirm that yet. The problem is with MP4 or QuickTime, because I inserted an AVI video as a test, and it worked fine.

I did find a work-around: I discovered that a Windows Media Player control can be added to a PowerPoint slide. I did that, and can play the video within that. The slide doesn't look as good as it would with just an inserted video clip, but that will work for now while I try to solve the insertion problem.

The Following User Says Thank You to RetiredGeek For This Useful Post:

I'm using the PPT as part of a webinar, and I'm now having audio problems with the video clip. I'm just going to present the video separately, in Windows Media Player or QuickTime. The next time I need to add video to PPT, I’ll ask for it in a format other than MP4 - either AVI or WMV.

Thanks for the tip about video converters. I may need one if I have to play an MP4 video in PPT again. My work-around for the webinar was to play the video in Windows Media Player. I still had audio problems, but I found a work-around for that too.